8. The applicants were born in 1959, 1948 and 1952 respectively. They live in Milan and Rome respectively.
9. The applicants inherited plots of building land, located at Nuoro and entered in the land register as folio 43, parcels 4, 11, 13, 31 and 32, and folio 41, parcels 3, 217 and 219 respectively. Each of the applicants has a holding of 29/360.
10. By a decree of the “Bank for the South” (Cassa per il Mezzogiorno) of 9 April 1976 and two decrees by the President of the Sardinia Regional Council of 7 and 17 January 1977, a project to build low-rent housing and leisure structures on the applicants' land was approved.
11. By three decrees, adopted on 1 December 1976 and 20 May and 15 June 1977 respectively, the President of the Sardinia Regional Council authorised possession under the expedited procedure of part of the applicants' land, namely 77,782 square metres, for a maximum period of five years, with a view to its expropriation, in order to begin construction of the low-rent housing and leisure structures.
12. On 20 January, 28 June and 22 July 1977 the authorities took physical possession of the applicants' land.
13. By a writ served on 11 November 1983, the applicants brought an action for damages before the Nuoro Court against the Nuoro Municipality.
14. They alleged that the occupation of the land was illegal and that the construction work had been completed without there having been a formal expropriation of the land and payment of compensation. They claimed a sum corresponding to the market value of the land and a sum for loss of enjoyment of the land.
15. During the proceedings an expert report and an additional report were submitted to the court registry on 8 February 1990 and 30 April 1992 respectively. According to the expert, a first section of the land had been irreversibly altered in 1982, and a second section in 1983, through the public works performed. The total market value of the occupied land in 1982 and 1983 was 5,372,538,000 liras (ITL), or ITL 432,787,783 for each applicant. The expert assessed the compensation for possession of the land at ITL 1,611,761,400, or ITL 129,836,335 per applicant.
16. By a provisional judgment of 14 July 1997, the Nuoro Court declared that the possession of the land, initially authorised, had become illegal as of 1982 and 1983. It found that the land had been irreversibly transformed by the public works. As a result, in accordance with the constructive expropriation rule (occupazione acquisitiva), the applicants had been deprived of their property, by virtue of its irreversible alteration, on the date on which the possession had ceased to be legal. In the light of those considerations, the court ordered the municipality to pay, as an advance, a sum equal to 55% of the market value of the land, namely ITL 238,033,280 for each applicant, plus interest and adjustment for inflation, and compensation for occupation amounting to ITL 129,836,334 for each applicant.
17. In the same judgment, the court ordered that the proceedings be continued in order to recalculate the final sum to be awarded to the applicants under Law no. 662 of 1996, which had entered into force in the meantime.
18. On 27 March 1997 the municipality paid the applicants the amounts due in application of the provisional judgment of 14 July 1997. Tax, at a rate of 20 %, was deducted at source from these sums.
19. In a final judgment filed with the registry on 17 July 2003, the Nuoro court upheld its provisional judgment of 14 July 1997 and held that the amount of compensation calculated under Law no. 662 of 1996 corresponded to the amount already paid in application of the provisional judgment.
20. This final judgment became legal and binding on 17 October 2004.